“If this was one time a shift, that might be okay but it might six or ten times. That’s where this process can get too much. We are keeping the pie chart people happy but it is not delivering policing. That’s where we have lost our way.

“We need to make sure data and crime recording is ethical and properly done but the pendulum has swung too far.”

Simon Kempton, operational lead for the Police Federation, said the demand for collecting statistics and assessing vulnerability had steadily increased each year with new Home Office recording requirements reinforced by new IT systems installed by forces.

The most recent introduced last year required officers to fill out a 10-page form for use of force including what happened, where, whether officers were threatened, who was injured and where on their body. It could take over 10 minutes in some forces to complete for each person arrested.

As an officer, he also now had to log incidents such as rubble on a road which might have been removed by a Good Samaritan by the time he arrived. “In the past, I would say it’s removed, NFPA [no further police action]” he said.

“Now I will be sent a form on my mobile or desktop, and have to fill out empty boxes on who was the officer, when attended, the risk, it goes on and on and on.

Someone somewhere may be desperate to know how many times, there were call-outs to the road and maybe it would have been easier when we had 22,000 more police officers.

“But it can’t be right when officers are so stretched they are not answering some high priority calls.”

The National Police Chief' Council said: "Policing has made efficiency savings of £1.6bn since 2011, and will deliver a further £350 million by 2018/19. A range of programmes are underway to improve collaboration and technology making us more efficient.

"We are also driving out any bureaucracy to enable officers to spend more time on core policing. “Recording use of force gives the public far greater transparency and we will use the data to improve training and tactics.”

“The use of force form consolidates other additional forms of recording, such as use of Taser, and is designed to be intuitive. Only the most complex of incidents involve using the full form.”